Month: May 2020

You probably know that humor can reduce stress. In this time of “Stay 6 feet away,” humor can also bring us closer together. Of course, if your humor makes fun of a person it can make ‘em wish you were 6 miles away.

Well, I’m gonna show you how to create your own humor.

We have all been watching Governors and Mayors presenting updates on COVID-19. And they usually have a Sign Language interpreter right beside of ‘em. These folks are expert communicators and they use exaggerated facial expressions and body language in addition to signing with their hands. Sometimes, I wish the elected official was equally expressive.

Naturally, while watching more television we’re sitting through more commercials. Many are for pharmaceutical drugs that have side effects. After bragging about the terrific health benefits, they are required to give the negative side effects. But when you are watching, the scary words are always overshadowed by lovely images of people, miraculously healed. They’re dancing, playing with grandchildren, jogging in a park, leading a band, or just having a grand ole time.

So here is how you have fun with this. When a drug commercial is half done, listen closely to the scary side effects BUT ignore the beautiful images. Instead, picture a Sign Language expert interpreting the frightening words.

I’ll get you started. Here are actual phrases from commercials. Picture an animated Sign Language interpreter as you read these:

“Do not take if pregnant. It can cause harm or death to an unborn baby.”
“Side effects include low blood pressure and kidney problems.”
“Can make you suicidal and lead to fatal throat swelling.”
“Side effects include Constipation, Skin rash, Diarrhea, and Dizziness.”
“May give intense urges to gamble, spend money, eat compulsively, and engage in sex.”

Humor will help get us through this Pandemic. And that little payment from the federal government won’t hurt either.

Historic quote by Will Rogers:

“We cuss the lawmakers, but I notice we’re always perfectly willin’ to share in any of the sums of money that they might distribute.  We cuss ’em for distributing it, we say it’s wrong and unsound, but we don’t refuse to take it.   No, we’ll grab it every time. We say our government is nutty and that it’s throwing away money.   But anytime any is thrown our way, why we’ve never dodged it.” Radio, Apr. 7, 1935

You might have missed the big news out of Washington last week. It wasn’t the coronavirus; we’ve had a steady diet of that, day and night.

The news that kinda slipped out is that Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn had all charges against him dropped. Back in January 2017, the FBI tricked him into pleading guilty to made-up charges related to Russia.  Then his lawyers charged him over a million dollars and still didn’t get him off at the time. They ought to give half of it back to him, and the top guys at the FBI that duped him ought to pay the other half.

Also last week, the Director of National Intelligence published transcripts of secret testimony to the House Intelligence committee from a year or two ago. The same top FBI and other Intelligence folks that testified, under oath, have been telling us on television the complete opposite of what they said to Congress. And the Chair of that committee, who heard the truth, has been lying to us about having solid evidence to the contrary. They were telling us they knew that Trump and Putin conspired to steal the 2016 election. Well, lo and behold, in their official testimony they gave no evidence at all.

You will notice I did not name these scoundrels. I like the policy of our best news media who, when there’s a mass murder, they don’t name the culprit because he most likely wants the publicity and become famous.

This whole episode brings up an important point in the Constitution. If it’s illegal for these scoundrels to lie to Congress why isn’t it illegal for them (and Congressmen) to lie to us?

On that coronavirus, we’re learning that it probably did not come from a Lab in Wuhan and it wasn’t created by a mad scientist with GMOs. It probably came from a wild animal that bit somebody as far back as October. The ones to blame are the Communist Chinese leaders. They moved quickly to protect the rest of their country, but turned the virus loose on the rest of the world. They bribed the W.H.O. to lie for ‘em so no one would be suspicious until it was too late.

The only long-term solution is to get rid of the Communist rulers. President Reagan did it with the USSR in the 1980s. You remember: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall!”

But Chinese Communists are different. We’ve been making friends with ‘em for thirty years, trying to butter ‘em up and get them to change. They pretended to change, got a slew of our manufacturing moved to China, and they buy our farm goods at a bargain price. But they are still devious communists aiming to beat us. An internal revolt won’t be easy, just ask Venezuelans. But until communism is tossed out and they get Taiwan and Hong Kong to show ‘em how to prosper in freedom, China will keep tormenting the world. And releasing other viruses.

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

“If you ever injected truth into politics you have no politics.” WA #31, July 15, 1923

“The Chinese as a race have forgot more honesty, and gentlemanliness than we will ever know if we live another Century.” WA #217, Feb. 6, 1927

You probably know I like our local newspaper; read it every day, front to back. Yesterday the paper had an editorial that really caught my eye. After 4 months of investigating the coronavirus, the editorial board conclusively determined the Number One cause of the pandemic is… beef cattle.

Who would ever imagine that our ranchers out West and farmers in Appalachia could be the culprits? The editorial also took a whack at our corn producers for gobbling up so much land just to satisfy our appetite for beef. What these city editors don’t realize is that for about three-fourths of its life an Angus or Hereford steer is eating grass from Western rangeland or hillside pastures back East. Neither location is fit for growing massive amounts of vegetables the editors want us all to live on.

An editorial cartoon by Toles on the same page showed a meatpacking plant. For every truckload of beef leaving the plant a sick worker was hauled away in an ambulance. Now, we know that Tyson and Smithfield and other meat packers have been hit with Covid-19 and that is the main reason grocery stores are running low on beef, pork and chicken. In retrospect those huge plants should have used a plan adopted by at least one supplier of medical supplies; they had all workers stay onsite for a month, working 12-hour shifts. That way no one could bring the virus into the plant and contaminate the workforce. Our meatpacking plants are essential for consumers and to keep farmers from having to depopulate their animals.

Our hometown paper is not the only one studying Covid-19. Speaker Pelosi and the Chair of the House Intel committee, Adam Schiff, don’t like this virus either. They want answers to why they did not learn until late February about a virus that started in Wuhan in November. So, working remotely from home, they have opened a wide-ranging global investigation. You might think they would start with the Communist Party rulers in Beijing. No, they are investigating the role of President Trump.

The U.S. and most other countries are going deeper in debt because of the coronavirus that started in China. After Congress approved over four Trillion in “printing press” dollars, they will likely allocate another two Trillion to states and cities that are broke. Remarkably, there’s only one foreign country that has plenty of excess cash to invest here in our airplanes, oilfields and farmland.  Yes, China.

If all this disgusts you, the one you should have a beef with is China.

Do you remember when Trump announced he had “total authority” on when and how to reopen the country to business? Critics jumped all over that proclamation. It’s unconstitutional! But with so many protests in state capitols, I bet a lot of governors wish he had kept that authority.

Our Ohio Governor has been praised for his handling of Covid. He announced the reopening of certain businesses, including dentists, starting May 1 and others by May 16. But not barbers and hair salons. I received an email from our dentist outlining the new procedures to keep us and his staff protected. I emailed back and asked, “If I come in for a tooth cleaning, could you also give me a haircut?”

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

“All I know is what I read in the papers.” WA #129, May 31, 1925

“Steak on the plate went up. Steak on the hoof went down.” WA #118, March 15, 1925

“The President goes on the air tonight. I am anxious to hear the comments in the press. Even if it’s good, there is plenty of ‘em won’t like it. He can speak on the Lord’s Supper and get editorials against it. Never in our history was we as willing to blame somebody else for our troubles. America is just like an insane asylum. There is not a soul in it will admit they are crazy. Roosevelt being the warden at the present time, us inmates know he is the one that’s cuckoo.” DT #2723, Apr. 28, 1935